Journal of Neurosurgical Sciences 2001 Marzo;45(1):43-6

Neurocysticercosis. Case ­report

1 Department of Neurosurgery and Neuroradiology, Institute of Neurosurgery, University of Naples, School of Medicine, Naples, Italy;2 Department of Surgical Pathology and Cytopathology, University of Naples, School of Medicine, Naples, Italy

In the ­present ­review we ­report a ­case of a 53-­year-old wom­an affect­ed ­with a ­cyst sol­i­tary cere­bral hem­i­spher­ic ­lesion caus­ing ­acute gen­er­al­ized sei­zure. Clinical and neu­ro­ra­dio­log­ic diag­no­sis of cys­tic astro­cy­to­ma was per­formed and the ­patient was oper­at­ed. Microscopic anal­y­sis of the sur­gi­cal spec­i­men led to a diag­no­sis of par­a­sit­ic infec­tion, con­sis­tent ­with neurocysticercosis (NCC). NCC is the ­most fre­quent par­a­sit­o­sis of the cen­tral ner­vous ­system (CNS) in the ­world. The infec­tive ­agent is tae­nia soli­um lar­vae. It is endem­ic in Latin America, Africa and ­some Asiatic coun­tries, ­such as India. In Europe, ­many cas­es ­have ­been report­ed in Portugal, Spain, Poland and Romania. In Italy NCC is a ­rare dis­ease. In ­recent ­years no cas­es ­have ­been ­described, but ­with ­high ­rate of immi­gra­tion ­from endem­ic are­as (Africa and East Europe) ­this par­a­sit­o­sis ­will be ­found in our coun­try too, par­tic­u­lar­ly affect­ing com­mu­nities ­where hygien­ic con­di­tions are ­poor. In con­clu­sion we brief­ly analyze the rela­tion­ship ­between path­o­gen­e­sis of ­this par­a­sit­o­sis and its clin­i­cal symp­toms.